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Theater Owners' Booking Association
Theatre Owners Booking Association, or T.O.B.A., was the vaudeville circuit for African American performers in the 1920s. The theaters mostly had white owners, though about a third of them had black owners. These included the restored Morton Theater in Athens, Georgia, originally operated by "Pinky" Monroe Morton, and Douglass Theatre in Macon, Georgia, then owned and operated by Charles Henry Douglass. Theater owners booked jazz and blues musicians and singers, comedians, and other performers, including the classically trained, such as operatic soprano Sissieretta Jones, known as "The Black Patti", for black audiences. History The association was established following the work of vaudeville performer Sherman H. Dudley. By 1909, Dudley was commonly known as the "Lone Star Comedian" and had begun an attempt to have a black-owned and operated string of venues around the United States. By 1911, Dudley was based in Washington, D.C. as general manager and treasurer of the Colored Ac ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vaudeville
Vaudeville (; ) is a theatrical genre of variety entertainment which began in France in the middle of the 19th century. A ''vaudeville'' was originally a comedy without psychological or moral intentions, based on a comical situation: a dramatic composition or light poetry, interspersed with songs and dances. Vaudeville became popular in the United States and Canada from the early 1880s until the early 1930s, while changing over time. In some ways analogous to music hall from Victorian Britain, a typical North American vaudeville performance was made up of a series of separate, unrelated acts grouped together on a common bill. Types of acts have included popular and classical musicians, singers, dancers, comedians, trained animals, magicians, ventriloquists, strongmen, female and male impersonators, acrobats, clowns, illustrated songs, jugglers, one-act plays or scenes from plays, athletes, lecturing celebrities, minstrels, and films. A vaudeville performer ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gertrude "Ma" Rainey
Gertrude "Ma" Rainey ( Pridgett; April 26, 1886 – December 22, 1939) was an American blues singer and influential early-blues recording artist. Dubbed the " Mother of the Blues", she bridged earlier vaudeville and the authentic expression of southern blues, influencing a generation of blues singers. Rainey was known for her powerful vocal abilities, energetic disposition, majestic phrasing, and a "moaning" style of singing. Her qualities are present and most evident in her early recordings "Bo-Weevil Blues" and "Moonshine Blues". Gertrude Pridgett began performing as a teenager and became known as "Ma" Rainey after her marriage to Will "Pa" Rainey in 1904. They toured with the Rabbit Foot Minstrels and later formed their own group, ''Rainey and Rainey, Assassinators of the Blues''. Her first recording was made in 1923. In the following five years, she made over 100 recordings, including " Bo-Weevil Blues" (1923), "Moonshine Blues" (1923), " See See Rider Blues" (1925), the b ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Adelaide Hall
Adelaide Louise Hall (20 October 1901 – 7 November 1993) was an American-born UK-based jazz singer and entertainer. Her career spanned more than 70 years from 1921 until her death. Early in her career, she was a major figure in the Harlem Renaissance; she became based in the UK after 1938. Hall entered the ''Guinness Book of World Records'' in 2003 as the world's most enduring recording artist, having released material over eight consecutive decades."Devotees – Honours and Tributes" (researched and compiled by Stephen Bourne), Devotional. Adelaide Hall enters ''Guinness Book of World Records'' as the World's most enduring recording artiste. She performed with major artists such as Art Tatum, Ethel Waters, Josephine Baker, Louis Armstrong, Lena Horne, Bill "Bojangles" Robinson, Cab Calloway, Fela Sowande, Rud ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Minto Cato
Minto Cato (born La Minto Cato, August 23, 1900 – October 26, 1979) was a mezzo-soprano opera singer and show performer during the Harlem Renaissance from the 1920s to the late 1940s. Life and career Minto Cato was born in Little Rock, Arkansas. She received her musical education at the Washington Conservatory of Music and School of Expression, Washington Conservatory of Music in Washington, D.C., and soon after began teaching piano in public schools in Arkansas and Georgia. In 1919, she opened a music studio in Detroit. She started her career on B. F. Keith's vaudeville circuit in Detroit's Temple Theater in 1922. In 1923, Cato married the impresario Joe Sheftell. Around 1924, she gave birth to a daughter named Minto Cato Sheftell. Cato performed in many of Sheftell's shows during the 1920s, including the ''Creole Bronze Revue''. Together they toured of Europe, Alaska, Canada, and Mexico in a show they called the ''Southland Revue''. In 1927, Cato separated from her husband ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mamie Smith
Mamie Smith ( Robinson; May 26, 1891 – August or September 16, 1946) was an American singer. As a vaudeville singer, she performed in multiple styles, including jazz and blues. In 1920, she entered blues history as the first African-American artist to make vocal blues recordings. Willie "The Lion" Smith (no relation) described the background of these recordings in his autobiography ''Music on My Mind'' (1964). Early life Robinson was born in Cincinnati, Ohio in 1891. The year of her birth has been given as 1883, but in 2018, researcher John Jeremiah Sullivan discovered her birth certificate stating she was born in Cincinnati in 1891. When she was around age 10, she found work touring with the Four Dancing Mitchells, a white act. As a teenager, she danced in Salem Tutt Whitney's ''Smart Set''. In 1913, she left the Tutt Brothers to sing in clubs in Harlem and married William "Smitty" Smith, a singer. Musical career On February 14, 1920, Smith recorded "That Thing Called ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
New York City
New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive with a respective county. The city is the geographical and demographic center of both the Northeast megalopolis and the New York metropolitan area, the largest metropolitan area in the United States by both population and urban area. New York is a global center of finance and commerce, culture, technology, entertainment and media, academics, and scientific output, the arts and fashion, and, as home to the headquarters of the United Nations, international diplomacy. With an estimated population in 2024 of 8,478,072 distributed over , the city is the most densely populated major city in the United States. New York City has more than double the population of Los Angeles, the nation's second-most populous city. [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Akashic Books
Akashic Books is a Brooklyn-based independent publisher, formed in 1997. It was started by Johnny Temple (bassist), Johnny Temple, bassist of Girls Against Boys and mid-'80s Dischord band Soulside, with the mission "to make literature more part of popular culture, not just a part of elitist culture." Akashic Books' collection began with Arthur Nersesian's ''The Fuck Up'' in 1997, and has since expanded to include Dennis Cooper's ''Little House on the Bowery'' series, Chris Abani's ''Black Goat'' poetry series, and the internationally successful ''Noir'' series, originating with ''Brooklyn Noir'', since expanding to international titles such as ''Delhi Noir'' and ''Havana Noir''. Akashic Books authors include T Cooper, Ron Kovic, Derek McCormack (writer), Derek McCormack, Melvin Van Peebles, Ryan Adams, Lydia Lunch, Richard Hell, Nina Revoyr, Les Claypool, Pete Hamill, Carlos Pintado, Lawrence Block, Travis Jeppesen, James Greer (writer), James Greer, Joe Meno, Elizabeth Nunez, A ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Baltimore Afro-American
The ''Baltimore Afro-American'', commonly known as ''The Afro'' or ''Afro News'', is a weekly African-American newspaper published in Baltimore, Maryland. It is the flagship newspaper of the ''AFRO-American'' chain and the longest-running African-American family-owned newspaper in the United States, established in 1892. History Initially the ''Afro-American'' was known as the ''Home Protector'' which was established and edited by The Reverend, Reverend William Alexander in 1889. With the help of a group of investors, including John R. Cole, Charles H. Richardson, James E. Johnson, and William H. Daly, the ''Home Protector'' became the ''Afro-American'' on August 13, 1892. In the spring of 1895, the Northwestern Family Supply Company (NFSC), assumed control of the ''Afro-American''. Although this seemed to be a turn for the best, that prominent business firm went bankrupt leading to near end of the newspaper. In 1897, the machinery used to print the ''Afro-American'' went u ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Edmonia Henderson
Edmonia Henderson (December 25, 1898 or 1900 – February 17, 1947) was an American classic female blues singer. She was active as a recording artist in the mid-1920s, recording at least 14 songs between 1924 and 1926. She later became an evangelist. At various times, Henderson sang accompanied by Jelly Roll Morton, Tommy Ladnier, Lovie Austin, Eddie Heywood, and Johnny Dodds. Career Some sources state that she was born Jennie Katherine Edmonia Henderson, in Jefferson County, Kentucky (present-day Louisville), in 1900. However, the researchers Bob Eagle and Eric LeBlanc state that she was born Edmonia Kath Landen in Tennessee on December 25, 1898. Henderson appeared in vaudeville, both as a solo artist and as part of Joe Clark's Revue, performing on the Theater Owners Booking Association circuit, including appearances in Baltimore, Chicago, and Nashville. In 1925, she performed in ''Radio Girls'', another vaudeville revue, which included Bessie Williams, Mamie Jeffers ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bessie Smith
Bessie Smith (April 15, 1892 – September 26, 1937) was an African-American blues singer widely renowned during the Jazz Age. Nicknamed the "Honorific nicknames in popular music, Empress of the Blues" and formerly Queen of the Blues, she was the most popular female blues singer of the 1930s. Inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1989, she is often regarded as one of the greatest singers of her era and was a major influence on fellow blues singers, as well as jazz vocalists. Born in Chattanooga, Tennessee, Smith was young when her parents died, and she and her six siblings survived by performing on street corners. She began touring and performed in a group that included Ma Rainey, and then went out on her own. Her successful recording career with Columbia Records began in 1923, but her performing career was cut short by a car crash that killed her at the age of 45. Biography Early life The 1900 census indicates that her family reported that Bessie Smith was bor ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ma Rainey
Gertrude "Ma" Rainey ( Pridgett; April 26, 1886 – December 22, 1939) was an American blues singer and influential early-blues recording artist. Dubbed the " Mother of the Blues", she bridged earlier vaudeville and the authentic expression of southern blues, influencing a generation of blues singers. Rainey was known for her powerful vocal abilities, energetic disposition, majestic phrasing, and a "moaning" style of singing. Her qualities are present and most evident in her early recordings "Bo-Weevil Blues" and "Moonshine Blues". Gertrude Pridgett began performing as a teenager and became known as "Ma" Rainey after her marriage to Will "Pa" Rainey in 1904. They toured with the Rabbit Foot Minstrels and later formed their own group, ''Rainey and Rainey, Assassinators of the Blues''. Her first recording was made in 1923. In the following five years, she made over 100 recordings, including " Bo-Weevil Blues" (1923), "Moonshine Blues" (1923), " See See Rider Blues" (1925), the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ethel Waters
Ethel Waters (October 31, 1896 – September 1, 1977) was an American singer and actress. Waters frequently performed jazz, swing, and pop music on the Broadway stage and in concerts. She began her career in the 1920s singing blues. Her notable recordings include "Dinah", " Stormy Weather", " Taking a Chance on Love", "Heat Wave", " Supper Time", " Am I Blue?", " Cabin in the Sky", " I'm Coming Virginia", and her version of " His Eye Is on the Sparrow". Waters was the second African American to be nominated for an Academy Award, the first African American to star on her own television show, and the first African-American woman to be nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award. Early life Ethel Waters was born in Chester, Pennsylvania, on October 31, 1896 (some sources incorrectly state her birth year as 1900) to African-American mother Louise Anderson (1881–1962). Her birth was the result of the rape of teenaged Louise Anderson by 17-year-old John Wesley (a.k.a. Wesley John) Wat ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
